fate's fickle choices
by Ryuosen
Summary: A butterfly can cause a hurricane, a small splash a tsunami and Virginia Gray's support changed fate. She just didn't know how much.
1. just a little more support

Fate's fickle choices  
- a Heroes story -

author: ryuosen  
written for the Sylar/Peter advent calendar at the sylar_peter lj community  
genre: Action, romance  
Pairings: Sylar/Peter, Nathan/Heidi  
Rating: M for language and sexual actions

Summary:  
A butterfly can cause a hurricane, a small splash a tsunami and Virginia Gray's support changed fate. She just didn't know how much.

* * *

_Prologue - Just a little more support_

Life sucked! Gabriel Gray couldn't describe it in any other way.

Especially today. Peering around the edge of the building his eyes searched quickly for any obstacles who would keep him from going home early. But there was nothing, no teacher, no schoolyard bullies. Gabriel couldn't believe his luck.

After one more check, he sprinted over the schoolyard towards the stands where his bicycle was chained to a tree. He almost made it when Frederic Depuis, resident jock and schoolyard bully, stepped out from he he had been hidden from view.

Gabriel cussed under his breath, but didn't slow down. It was too late anyway. Frederic's fist shot out and hit Gabriel with the power of someone who lifted weights on a regular basis. The brunet lost his footing while trying to dodge the punch and landed awkwardly on the ground. Pain shot up his am as he used a hand to catch the fall but he ruthlessly suppressed any noise. It would only serve as incentive for his tormentor.

Something he didn't need at all, it would be bad enough.

A foot landed on his back, pressing him onto ground and a tiny groan escaped him. The bastard laughed and another punch hit his head. Footsteps were steadily coming closer and Gabriel knew already who that would be - Frederic's friends!

It shouldn't hurt he supposed. After all be was used to this kind of beatings whether they were administered for being a freak, a poor freak or because he simply existed. Yet thinking of the hate in Frederic's eyes still send a stab of agony through his mind. They had been friends once.

Not anymore...

Blissfully Gabriel retreated into the free confines of his mind as more fists and feet joined the fray. When he came back to himself all would be over and done with, he knew.

When he came back to conscious Gabriel was surprised. Instead of lying on the ground near his bicycle he felt comfortable and warm. Turning his head onto the side be saw his mother, sleeping in an uncomfortable looking chair. The smell of disinfectant graced his nose. It reminded him of the school nurse's office.

A hospital, perhaps?

But why would he be in a hospital? Frederic and the others had beaten him numerous times and after they had finished he would get up and limp home to treat his wounds. So why not this time?

His thoughts were unpleasant and Gabriel gave gladly into the pull the darkness held, all to escape the pain. He never heard his mother's frantic screams as a shrill beeping sound sped up before vanishing altogether.


	2. The destruction of a snow globe

Fate's fickle choices  
- a Heroes story -

written by ryuosen  
Genre: angst, drama, action, sci-fi, het, slash, romance  
Pairings: Virginia/Martin, others to follow  
Rating: PG13 (will go up)  
Warnings: language, violence

Summary:  
A butterfly can cause a hurricane, a small splash a tsunami and Virginia Gray's support changed fate. She just didn't know how much.

* * *

_Chapter 1 - The destruction of a snow globe_

The calendar on the wall above her snow globe collection was mocking her. Today's date encircled with a bright red color. She couldn't remember having done the marking but either way it didn't matter. In fact the marking of the date had been an all but useless precaution.

Virginia remembered well. How could she forget that day!?

She couldn't.

All mother's would probably remember. She was no different from them, be it the mother two doors down or the starlet her son had found so pretty.

One thing they had all in common, even if Virginia was otherwise as unremarkable as countless others and she had always known she would never be remembered for anything worthwhile.

Not that she hadn't tried, even early in her life when she had been a young woman she had thought about becoming someone other than a homemaker. She had dreamed of a life as an actress or a well-known author.

What a fool's dream...

She discovered soon enough that she neither had any acting talent nor could she write interesting stories. Her dreams died when her second draft had been sent back, telling her in no uncertain terms that she absolutely no talent and should never take up her pen again.

Apparently some took pleasure in destroying the dreams of others she mused and her fingers caressed the snow globe containing the state of Rhode Island. Lifting the trinket she turned it upside down, watching as the glittering flaking swirled around before sinking back down.

Remarkable how beautiful, how special such a little bubble could be, just like she should have been. Her grip tightened - _just like her son_ - and abruptly she threw the glass bubble against the wall. It smashed right next to the calendar, bursting in a thousand shards, splashing glitter everywhere, the miniature continent rolling before her feet.

Ruthlessly she stepped on it, crushing the continent beneath her flat heel.

Tears were running down her face as she gazed at her remaining snow globe collection, now down another one. Just like last year and the year before.

What a fool she had been, because Virginia still remembered the day Gabriel Gray had died.

Seventeen years old and her son had died of a cardiac arrest. The shrill beeping sounds still rang in her ears as doctors and nurses had stormed the room and tried to save her only child. When silence descended over the small room and she had been evicted Virginia had feared the worst.

It had taken five minutes, five agonizing minutes before a doctor had come to her and announced that they had managed to pull her child back from the brink of death.

She still remembered how she had wept in happiness.

Turning away from the ever dwindling collection of trinkets she walked towards her dresser. The wood had darkened with age and soon it would start to fall apart, yet it was the only piece of furniture left from her old apartment in Queens. The rest and her eyes wandered towards the other furniture in her apartment, was new, expensive and modern. It didn't fit her personality at all - far too extravagant for her. But the apartment had been a gift from her son and she couldn't have said _no_ if she wanted to.

Virginia should have been proud, her son had succeeded in everything she had failed. Yet every year she smashed another of her snow globe collection. Now ten years after the incident, a quarter had already been destroyed.

Carefully she lifted the photo from the dresser looked at her son who gazed shyly into the camera, the clothes threadbare and oversized.

Taken only one month before the beating that changed everything, it was Virginia's only memento of the time before the beating. Before she had always scoffed at the parents who needed to document every single moment of their child's lives. Now she regretted it, feeling foolish because the first seventeen years of her son were told in three measly photos. One of Gabriel sitting on his first bike, one of his first school day and the last one taken at a charity day at high school, her beloved son selling cakes to various people.

However of the next ten there were numerous. Each and every one of them showing her son, suddenly smiling with confidence and happiness.

The remaining photos she left alone, she knew each by heart.

And every year she wondered anew how she could have been so blind as to not have seen her son's suffering. No she had only noticed when the source of the suffering was gone and Gabriel had suddenly started to smile, to confide in her about his own dreams and plans for the future.

Unsurprisingly none of them involved becoming a watchmaker like his father had been.

"_If the shop had still been there, I might have considered taking it, but it's gone so I don't see any reason to do that. I can work on my watches in my free time. Besides if I get that internship these holidays I'll know more and can plan accordingly." Gabriel said, before shrugging and smiling at her," but it's good to know that you'll support anything I might do."_

Virginia had felt guilty when Gabriel had said that, knowing she wouldn't have supported him at all, had he really decided to waste his talents and become a _mere_ watchmaker.

It made her glad that she had had the foresight to sell Martin's old shop. Not only had it covered Gabriel's treatment but it had enabled her to put some money aside for Gabriel's college fund which had been rather meager up to that day. Without the sell he might have never gotten the option of going to college, of gaining the chance to be awarded a scholarship.

So many things she had done wrong by her child.

She had been foolish, had been blind to the pressure she had exerted over her son and most of all she had failed him for not seeing the bullying he suffered. Had it not been for the collapsed lung and subsequent heart failure she might have never known...

… Gabriel might never have been reborn.

The shards cracked under her heels as she walked over to the calendar, looked at the date before using the attached pencil to viciously marking the day as done. Her son's first words echoing in her ears as she did so.

"_I understand everything now... everything..."_


End file.
